Tuesday, January 12, 2016

New Study Finds Marginalization Main Reason For Sunni Support For Insurgency

Mercy Corps recently released
a study based upon three years worth of polling and interviews in Iraq on
public perceptions of the government and armed groups. The organization did
polls in 2013, 2014 and 2015. This provided it with an important insight as it
discovered how the change in government from Prime Minister Nouria al-Maliki to
Premier Hadiar Abadi affected the populace’s perceptions. It found that Maliki’s
marginalization of Sunnis, and the lack of services were the main reasons why
people were upset with the government and supported armed groups.

The most interesting part of the Mercy Corps’ report was how
Sunni opinion changed about the insurgency before and after the Maliki government.
The organization was conducting its third year of surveying in Iraq when Prime
Minister Nouri al-Maliki lost office to Haidar Abadi. That allowed it to
measure how the transition in leadership affected Sunni perceptions. Most
striking was that support for armed groups amongst the community went from 49%
in 2014 to 26% in 2015. Part of that drop might have been due to Anbar not
being included in the second survey, but even then it was such a sizeable drop
that the absence of that one province could not account for the entire change. More
importantly, the only major difference between the two polls was the
replacement of Maliki as premier. The former prime minister was widely
unpopular amongst Sunnis due to his targeting of Sunni politicians such as
former Finance Miniser Rafi Issawi that led to year long protests. The security
forces were also blamed for arbitrary and mass arrests, and attacked two
demonstration sites in Ramadi and Hawija. This supported Mercy Corps’ thesis
that it was marginalization and bad governance rather than the oft cited
sectarianism that was a root cause for the rise of the Islamic State and the
rebirth of the insurgency. If sect for example, was the main cause of
complaints by Sunnis then they would still support armed groups after Abadi
took office as he was a Shiite as well.

Sunni opinions of the government overall improved after
Abadi became prime minister as well. When asked about the police, the
government, security, and job prospects opinions went up around 10% each from
2014 to 2015. Electricity saw the largest increase going from 59% to 72%.
Again, the change in administration made Sunnis feel better about a range of
issues from the security forces to services. There seemed to be hope that Abadi
would be fairer than his predecessor, and thus people’s opinions improved.

That did not mean that sectarianism and feelings of prejudice
did not show up in the poll. When asked about whether the government treated
their sect unfairly a majority of Sunnis and Shiites said yes. Around 80% of
Sunnis believed they were not treated fairly sometimes, and about 2% said often.
40% of Shiites stated the same with around 10% adding they felt that way often.
These were surprising results. It is widely accepted that Sunnis feel that the
government discriminates against them, yet the vast majority only responded
sometimes, and not often. At the same time, 50% of Shiites felt the same way
with a larger percentage 10% versus 2% saying often. Since the government is
Shiite led one would expect that community to feel that they are treated fairly
if not better, but the opposite was found. Shiites might have felt that the
government was too compromising with other communities to their detriment.
Another possibility was that since its community runs most of the government
they believed they should be treated better in terms of services, etc., but
because they were not it must be because of some sort of discrimination.

Dissatisfaction with the government was widespread as Iraqis
felt that problems were getting worse from 2013 to 2015. Corruption was at the
top of the list going from 50% saying it was a problem in 2013 to 73% in 2015.
Education went from 25% to 35%, electricity grew from 15% to 32%, health care
increased from 28% to 33%, and services increased from 21% to 39%. Iraq is notorious for being one of the most
corruption countries in the world. Many services have also been deficient since
2003. That’s caused several years of protests across the country with the
latest starting in the summer of 2015 and continuing to the present day. The
fact that so many Iraqis from different communities feel the same way offers
the opportunity for cross-ethnosectarian cooperation. Unfortunately, that has
not been realized as the political class is unwilling to initiate any real
reforms, especially when it comes to corruption, because it would threaten its
patronage networks, which it relies upon to stay in power.

The Mercy Corps surveys and another one just released by Greenberg
Quinlan Rosner Research both complicated the sectarian narrative that
dominates much of the discussion about Iraq. Both polls found the ill treatment
by the government were the most important issues. For Mercy Corps, Sunni
perceptions of Maliki were a determining factor in their support for the
insurgency. Likewise, Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research found that desire for a
fair judicial system was the most important issue for Sunnis. Both surveys also
discovered that Sunnis were relatively hopeful about the Abadi government. If
the community perceived everything in strict sectarian terms than they would
not think that a new Shiite premier would be any better than the last. Identity
politics is obviously still a major issue in Iraq, but what these two studies
highlight is that they do not always play out as many would expect. They also
highlight that tackling issues that affect all Iraqis like electricity and
graft would garner support across the country, but no politicians are willing
to make that move because it would disturb the status quo that put them in
office. Prime Minister Abadi for example, offered a round of reforms in
response to the latest protests, but they’ve ground to a halt as most of the
parties quickly turned on him, and the premier was trying to use them for his
own gain as well. That may eventually lead the public to turn on him if he is
not able to deliver on any of his promises again proving Mercy Corps’ thesis
that poor government is the driving issue in the country.

SOURCES

Mercy Corps, “Investing In Iraq’s Peace, How Good Governance
Can Diminish Support for Violent Extremism,” January 2016

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About Me

Musings On Iraq was started in 2008 to explain the political, economic, security and cultural situation in Iraq via original articles and interviews. I have written for the Jamestown Foundation, Tom Ricks’ Best Defense at Foreign Policy and the Daily Beast, and was responsible for a chapter in the book Volatile Landscape: Iraq And Its Insurgent Movements. My work has been published in Iraq via NRT, AK News, Al-Mada, Sotaliraq, All Iraq News, and Ur News all in Iraq. I was interviewed on BBC Radio 5, Radio Sputnik, CCTV and TRT World News TV, and have appeared in CNN, the Christian Science Monitor, The National, Columbia Journalism Review, Mother Jones, PBS’ Frontline, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Institute for the Study of War, Radio Free Iraq, Rudaw, and others. I have also been cited in Iraq From war To A New Authoritarianism by Toby Dodge, Imagining the Nation Nationalism, Sectarianism and Socio-Political Conflict in Iraq by Harith al-Qarawee, ISIS Inside the Army of Terror by Michael Weiss and Hassan Hassahn, The Rise of the Islamic State by Patrick Cocburn, and others. If you wish to contact me personally my email is: motown67@aol.com